Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Chris -- 2018-04-11
Today I encountered this:
I am not ghetto, loud, ratchet.
Curious, I looked up “ratchet” at urbandictionary.com, which said:
A ghetto-dialect mispronunciation of the English term “wretched”.
This blog enlarged upon that definition thus:
...a term for someone that is either; 1. A whore 2. Dirty/Nasty 3. Ghetto as HELL 4. Annoying 5. Busted
Examples:
My Hip Hop class I was feeling ratchet and ghetto this day lol
video caption
Beyonce has been feeling ratchet recently and that is evident with “Bow Down,†where she goes at a bunch of unnamed chicks.
music discussion
…or if you’re just really feeling ratchet about your workday, you can just watch them now.
web series review
I don’t see any likely meaning-confusion, so won’t call this an eggcorn. I think it’s just a substitution based on confusing two similar-sounding words, along with a broadening of meaning as the slang takes on more connotations. I just thought I’d mention it to save anyone else who encounters it from researching the possible eggcornicity.
Incidentally, I found quite a few hits for “wretched wrench”, but it looks like they’re probably all puns.
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